Made it to Toronto

So I have recently been transfered to Toronto from Austin, TX where I have been living for the last 12 years.  I moved here to take a promotion as the product manager for an online company that was operated out of Austin, TX, but was bought about 2 years ago and is now operating mostly out of Toronto.

So I got here about 3 months ago officially, but brought my car and my dog up here around Jan. 1, 2010.  It's been an interesting adjustment so far.  The 2 things that have effected me the most so far is the cold and the apartment living.  I'm living on the 15th floor of a decently large apartment building little out of downtown Toronto.  Having my dog here with me really makes that difference even more noticeable.

The next few things I've noticed which is different is how much less dependent people are on cars here.  Almost no one drives, and even people that do, use the subway, taxis, and buses to get to work at least.  Even I now walk to work every day.  Now combine that with the cold, and I've had to learn some important lessons.  Like, you lose a lot of heat out of your head and your ears have a lot of nerves in them so you need to keep them warm.  Also scarves are more then just decoration, they help keep you warm a lot, as do good socks and gloves hehe.  Yeah, so basically I've learned you really need to dress warmly.

Ok, so on to more cultural differences.  The first cultural difference I like and dislike is the grocery and specialty shopping.  Because most people still rely on foot for most of their travel (even if they use the subway they are walking), the layouts of the commercial establishments is different.  Instead of mega super markets and walmarts with huge parking lots in neutral locations, there are many many small grocers and specialty shops like meat markets, flower shops, electornics stores, etc.  Because it's much more convenient to just pick things up while you're out, you get these smaller establishments that are able to sustain themselves unlike in a lot of America.  Anyways, I have gotten to really like the minimal shopping (remember you have to carry all the groceries home too, so you can't just load up a whole car of groceries) done on almost a daily basis.

One of the more annoying things so far is the way trash works.  Being that these apartment buildings are so tall, they have a trash chute on each floor.  This sounds good at first until you realize you can only fit about 1/2 a kitchen bag full of trash down these things.  So you have to buy smaller trash cans/bags so that you can fit it down these things.  Also people leave these chutes open and make the whole floor stink sometimes.

The most pleasant surprise so far has been the amount of small parks there are scattered throughout the area.  I went out to 2 that are less then a block away from my apartment today with my dog.  Because there are so many, you can either find one where some dogs have congregated to play or basically find an open park nearby.  I got to watch my dog play in the ice for the first time, skidding around like a little puppy.  She also hasn't quite figured out what snow is yet, and loves to sniff around in it.

Ok, well, it's late here, which is another thing I've noticed...my friends and family are all back in Texas or California, so it gets later here them of the United States which kind of sucks.  Anyways, I'll be back on tomorrow to share more of my impressions of Toronto so far.

Nick

P.S.  Here's a picture of Toronto from my Balcony, I'll post more soon...this was just me testing my phone's camera after cleaning the lens hehe.